Current Events Portfolio

Post navigation

Camille LaBranche, Blog entry #1

Growing up in New Orleans I was never taught that the United States was the best country, not to say that that idea wasn’t taught in my city but rather that from the schools I went to and the experiences I had it was never ingrained in me that we are the best. Instead I was told that we are simply great, not the greatest. Being in such a large city most of my life, I saw so much poverty and crime, even in my own neighborhood, so it never really occurred to me that this could be the best place to live. I was taught to travel and experience the world as one beautiful amazing place because, essentially, that’s what it is. So I agree with Will when he says that we really aren’t the greatest country in the world. Even though believing that the United States is the best is an opinion, we even have the facts to prove it’s not that great in many aspects when Will says, “America is “7th in literacy, 27th in math, 22nd in science, 49th in life expectancy, 178th in infant mortality, 3rd in median household income, number 4 in labor force, and number 4 in exports. We lead the world in only 3 categories: number of incarcerated citizens per capita, number of adults who believe angels are real, and defense spending, where we spend more than the next 26 countries combined. 25 of whom are allies” (Wikiquote-”The Newsroom-(U.S. TV Series)”). We think so highly of ourselves when in reality if we just opened our eyes to all these places that are doing better than us, we’d see that we aren’t the greatest and learn from that. We also like to pride ourselves on being free but again like Will said, there are so many other countries who also have freedom and some even have more rights and freedoms than ourselves. And as lady with the cards in the audience said about the United States, “It’s not (the greatest). But it can be”.